PASADENA, California — For six long minutes, Baker Mayfield did not want to walk away. So he kept walking, on a winding and upsetting and uneasy path, around the Rose Bowl field and back again.

What must have gone through his mind through it all?

One of the fiercest competitors college football has seen in years waded through the crowd of his saddened Oklahoma teammates. He passed through the mob of Georgia players and coaches celebrating their 54-48 double-overtime triumph. He’d played his guts out in an unforgettable ballgame, an all-time classic on the most historic of stages.

And it wasn’t enough.

What was Mayfield thinking, one must wonder, in the six minutes after his college career was officially and abruptly over? When he was finally asked, he choked up and said it: “I can’t believe it’s over. It’s been a wild ride.”

As Sony Michel raced into the end zone and the Bulldogs stormed the field and red and white confetti...

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